improving light output for 1999 T&C?

It isn't. He is wrong.

The law applies no matter whether it is state or federal. So, if a state has a law that is more permissive, the federal applies, and vice versa.

Reply to
DTJ
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Sorry, no, DTJ.

Federal Code - Traffic and Vehicle Safety Act Title 15, chapter 1392

Supremacy of Federal Standards

[...]

(d) Whenever a Federal motor vehicle safety standard established under this subchapter is in effect, no State or political subdivision of a State shall have any authority either to establish, or to continue in effect, with respect to any motor vehicle or item of motor vehicle equipment any safety standard applicable to the same aspect of performance of such vehicle or item of equipment which is not identical to the Federal standard.

DS

Reply to
Daniel Stern Lighting

No. The Clean Air Act specifically authorized California to enact stricter standards. The Federal Act authorizing DOT to enact national lighting standards does not authorize states to enact stricter standards. Federal funds can be withheld if states choose not to enforce the federal standards.

Richard.

Reply to
Richard

Yes.

...or looser ones, or ones that differ in any respect.

Well, no, this part isn't correct. There is no requirement for states to adopt or enforce any Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard(s). The only thing the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Act says on the matter is that *if* a state has a technical standard that covers a device, system or aspect of design of a motor vehicle that is covered by a Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard, *then* the state standard must be identical to the Federal standard. In practice, this is a one-way deal: There are many state standards for lighting equipment that are less restrictive/more permissive than the Federal standard, and nobody carps about it. The problem would come if a state were to try to adopt a standard more restrictive/less permissive than the Federal standard. It would mean vehicles and equipment Federally legal for sale and use throughout the US would be illegal for sale and use in that state, and a large mess would ensue.

DS

Reply to
Daniel Stern Lighting

Which is a different statement. The federal highway funds are a way to pressure the states into adopting federal standards -- if more liberal federal laws simply took precedence in all circumstances, that wouldn't be necessary. A federal statute can't, in general, forbid a state from having a stricter one (there are exceptions to this rule based on civil rights or necessity, but making a case like that is much harder than just applying a little gentle extortion. Which is why the tactic should be regarded as an unconstitutional expansion of federal powers, but I digress).

Dan pointed out, correctly, that California successfully argued that they had a need for more restrictive vehicle pollution standards. AFAIK, no state tried to just implement tougher standards and let the results play out in court. My guess is that they would have won -- except, of course, the highway funds would have been used as a club to knock them into line long before it ever got to trial.

Reply to
Joe Pfeiffer

I've *really* got to wonder what would have happened if a state had challenged that one in court. It strikes me as blatantly unconstitutional (IANAL, of course).

Reply to
Joe Pfeiffer

Question, if a state department of transportation were to take a position against "blue lights" would that be taken into consideration by the Feds?

Ted

Reply to
Ted Mittelstaedt

Apparently some states or cities have tried ticketing people with HID lights only to get slapped down.

Reply to
Lloyd Parker

Doesn't this fall under the right of the federal government to regulate interstate commerce?

Ed

Reply to
C. E. White

If the defendant had an illegal HID retrofit, then the judge was an idiot.

Reply to
Arif Khokar

The problem was that people with DOT-certified, factory-equipment HID systems were getting tickets for "illegal blue headlights".

DS

Reply to
Daniel Stern Lighting

Reading the law literally, it doesn't matter -- if the state code is not identical to the Federal code, it is unenforcable, regardless of whether the particular violation would also violate the Federal code.

Reply to
Matthew Russotto

I take it that just one of those three categories has to be met?

(Such as, hmmm... Display?)

--Aardwolf.

Reply to
Aardwolf

Hey, sorry for the double-post, but reading on down the thread (and since this is cross posted to r.a.m.chrysler,) there is a question I've been meaning to ask for some time, in case I wind up with a '70 Polara: What exactly was Chrysler's Super-Lite, and how did it stack up as driving lights go?

--Aardwolf.

Reply to
Aardwolf

Stand by; I'll try and find the time to scan in a period article about it. The Super-Lite was a "mid beam" or "turnpike beam" lamp co-developed by Chrysler and Sylvania and available as an option on the '69 and '70 fullsize (C-body) Dodges. It was of a polyellipsoidal ("projector beam") design, the first use of such a design in a mass-produced car. It was considerably larger, deeper, heavier and less efficient than today's projector beams. Used an 85W quartz halogen bulb with a transverse filament, and produced a short but wide bar-shaped beam with very sharp cutoffs at all four sides, like this: ___________________________________________ | | |___________________________________________|

It was designed to supplement the low beams in situations where the high beams would cause too much glare but the low beams' reach was insufficient. It did a very good job of this, and the sharp cutoffs prevented glare, but the optical science behind polyellipsoidal vehicular lighting was still brand new, and so the technical challenges were largely unsolved. Chief among these was extreme chromatic aberration at each of the four cutoffs. In English: Very pronounced blue and red color fringes visible when observing the lamp from angles corresponding to the location of each cutoff. This caused several states to ban the unit on the grounds that it violated the restriction of red and blue light to emergency vehicles.

I have three or four of the units here at my office. Very interesting lamps indeed. The bulbs were not standard items, however, and I don't have any working bulbs at the current time.

DS

Reply to
Daniel Stern Lighting

Correct.

...which has very specific definitions.

DS

Reply to
Daniel Stern Lighting

Think VERY carefully about all 3 of those rules. Think about things that would make a product meet one of those rules.... now think about things that could make a product meet one of those rules when it comes off the assembly line or is inserted into a package, but could be un-done by the end-user within 10 seconds of opening the package.....

;-)

Reply to
Steve

I'll be very interested to see that. I've seen many restored '69/'70 C-bodies so equipped--I imagine that the hardware is not ultra-rare?

What is the range of the lamp (would it be worthwhile if used with H4/H1 quad round E-codes)?

--Aardwolf.

Reply to
Aardwolf

All right, all right--just so my actually _buying_ ECE lighting equipmment before I confirm my decision of what to do with it isn't the legal issue in question...

--Aardwolf.

Reply to
Aardwolf

Daniel, I've noticed this and I've read about it too -- do you know why BMW's HID lights seem so much worse as far as blinding other drivers than any other make's?

Reply to
Lloyd Parker

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